The Laurens advertiser. (Laurens, S.C.) 1885-1973, 1887-08-10
ctaihgsg e~EcuLIARIyiEs.

a ChinAsnnn Ssils Romo q ire Oussoua
Cassosns OF His Countrymon.
The highest ambition OF q Chinese gem
ueman Is to have o nice coffin and q nno
Funeral.
Old women instead Of the young are
tho Idols Of society.
Love making is only dono three DAYS
before marriage. 1t Is not only consid-
cred the safest way to get ahead of n
rival, but the surest way to get n wife
without losing much time,
n previous acQuaintanceship between
tho maie and female prevents them from
marriage. For this reason O man seldom
weds q girl Of his own town.
A man could borrow money on the
strength OF his having q son, but no ono
would advance him a cent if ho had a
mass Of debris slid into tho valley of the
Ilbcr, which, damned back by the OBJ
struction, overlooked the village of San
Stefano to the depth of so feet, until the
village was relieved by means
OF 4 hastily constructed canal. Another
example OF Il disastrous landslip is that in
wiich, by The sliding Of u portion OF
Monte Como, the entire village OF Plurs,
WIN 1850 inhabitants, was in 1913 over
whclmcd. For several days before the
catastrophe masses of rock had become
detached from the mountain, and numcr-
Gus fissurcs were Observed to form or
widen on its sides But tho villagers dis
regarded tho warnings, and were in q
few minutes buried with all their posses
sions beneath sixty fcct of rock and
carth. All attempts to penetrate tho
mass proved fruitlcss, and no trace of
the town has since been seen. Tho earth
which nptfIplp1 - T.. ,n., ltl-1 IN -
luXuriant forest Of chcstnuts, but tho
original name still survives in tue little
village of Pi.-s, or Pluru.
it may almost be said that these catas-
trophies arc SO frequent that history pre-
serves the memory Of only the most dia-
aStrous. Such a one waS that hy which
the village Of Elm wts overwhelmed only
q few years ago. As that time the place
contained fifty houses and nearly l10 in
imblt;mts, most Of them children and old
people. Nearly half &c !.em were killed.
while mo OF the dwelling houses were
altogether crushed or Hurled beneath tho
debris from TINT portion Of the T~cschingcl
Alps, which broke away fro,n its parent
mountain. Altogether, though the Elm
catastrophe was. In tho loss OF life md
property, OF Ras magnitude than those
which overlook Plurs md Goldau, It ia
doubtful whether 1t did not, in the amount
OF rubbish shot from tho mountain side.
surTass both OF these gigantic landslidcs.
The Swiss gcolo&ists who visited the spot
immediately afto0 the disaster calculated
that, Ut tie lowess estimate. the contenta
OF nae alp measures 10, OCJ. 600 cubic
metcsh- What o rast amount OF material
this Pdo oontnine may be grnspcd by o
simple illustration Zurtoh Is o city Of
10000 hlhabitentA Yot h tho debris shoa
from tho ride Of the Tsohinucl Alp there
wa Stone enough TO build two Zurbchs.
Some OF the blocks ase heape& 900 or 400
feet higher than the village ol Elm. One
rs estimated 70 weigh 5000 TONS and 90
these gigantic missiles were precipitatcd
from n height Of 1000 feet tho Irresistible
force with which they fell on tho doomed
villages can easily be imagined. London
Sfnnlarl